"When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth.”- George Bernard Shaw
Inspired by the above quotation, the longing in me to submerge myself into a book written by the author was ridiculously arousing and enigmatic. Influenced by people who lead their lives in a ‘lighter vein’ and burden themselves with quality when exists a purpose, the above saying engulfs my thoughts. Hence, my desire to claw on to a book written by George Bernard Shaw was desired and wanting.
With the desire in motion, the body says to indulge. Trying to find a book authored by Shaw in a country that lacks the resources to cater to a romanticizing idiot requires the essence of an innovator. The looming threat of a fuel strike and the monsoonal weather pattern did present a danger to the idea of venturing out but was considered a minor factor by an individual bearing a hunger to read. The thought of using the good old human-powered bicycle did strike a chord in the positive direction.
The idea though bold, the bicycle it was. With a lightweight raincoat and a backpack, settling myself into a rhythmic pattern of pedaling on a road with little traffic was an absolute pleasure. The direction or destination required meticulous planning because not all book shops in the city shelve the kind of books I was looking for and the excess roaming on a self powered machine tends to exhaust the energy of the rider too. With the limited knowledge I had of the shops that might contain literature from the above author, I visited the vendors with a sense of a positivist. Visiting, Inquiring, listening and diverting was the order of the day. Hearing the word ‘NO’ was a constant occurrence and to my battered body intensely distressing. My backpack was still an empty vessel and the excitement diminished to a lower frequency whilst paving my enthusiasm to passivity.
Nevertheless, the few street-side vendors, I visited for
fruit and drinks, kept me upbeat and spurring. The limited chit-chat is not in
vain and the gossip transcended from politics to music, sports to cost of
living and back. The intellectual point in the conversation was faint but gives
purpose to listening and indulging in the form of fulfilling life and in the
quest to motivate myself. With their meagre standards, life still must go on
and I take a leaf from this book that could be titled ‘lessons to learn.’ This
too was poetry in motion, but with a deficiency of a renowned dreamer to write
it. GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, where art thou?
Darley Road, around Maradana, may not sound like the right place to give thought but the place was on my way back home. The book shops, which I rather call kiosks, are ancient to the extent of my parent’s school days. They might have any kind of book or maybe….. Not. Surprised! One might be, for the kiosk owners have proved to be magicians in producing the most oblivious book on record and not have the most recently read. Thus, the visit is imminent, simply in the context of inevitability.
A row of shops, under a few large shady trees, looked more
like pavement hawkers and did not do my melancholic mood and cultivated
pessimism any good. Selecting a book shop was attributed mainly because it was
conveniently located to accommodate my comfort. The name and size did not matter.
In the shop, the books stacked up were numerous and plenty. I presumed was
mainly fiction or carried commercial appeal. Reluctantly, deciding to inquire
about a classic would probably be a bad idea. Not having much to lose but to
indulge in the process, is optimism I learned from the fruit vendors.
The classical book section or rather a shelf that was
shown to me was large in proportion to the size of the shop. SURPRISED does not
suffice, for I was astonished and beyond comprehension. It contained
books from Thomas Hardy and Joseph Conrad along with William Shakespeare to poets
like Lord Byron and Rudyard Kipling to name a few. GEORGE BERNARD SHAW was not
merely on a shelf in the form of books but appeared to be amongst his fellow
writers sharing his thoughts. An illusion no doubt, but I perceived it to be.
Excerpts from Wikipedia -
George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950) was an Irish playwright. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama and he wrote more than 60 plays. Nearly all his writings deal sternly with prevailing social problems, but have a vein of comedy to make their stark themes more palatable.
He was most angered by what he perceived as the exploitation of the working class. An ardent socialist, Shaw wrote many brochures and speeches for the Fabian society. He became an accomplished orator in the furtherance of its causes, which included gaining equal rights for men and women, alleviating abuses of the working class, rescinding private ownership of productive land, and promoting healthy lifestyles.
Shaw married Charlotte Payne-Townshend a fellow Fabian, whom he survived. They settled in Ayot St. Lawrence in a house now called Shaw's Corner. Shaw died there, aged 94, from injuries he incurred by falling.
He is the only person to have been awarded both a Nobel Prize for Literature (1925) and an Oscar (1938), for his contributions to literature and for his work on the film Pygmalion respectively. Shaw wanted to refuse his Nobel Prize outright because he had no desire for public honors, but accepted it at his wife's behest: she considered it a tribute to Ireland. He did reject the monetary award, requesting it be used to finance translation of Swedish books to English.
The Shavian alphabet (also known as Shaw alphabet) is an alphabet conceived as a way to provide simple, phonetic orthography for the English language and to replace the difficulties of the conventional spelling.
End.
He says-
"My way of joking is to tell the truth. It's the
funniest joke in the world."
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